The Greatest Experimental Books of All Time

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This list represents a comprehensive and trusted collection of the greatest books. Developed through a specialized algorithm, it brings together 759 'best of' book lists to form a definitive guide to the world's most acclaimed books. For those interested in how these books are chosen, additional details can be found on the rankings page.

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Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
1494 The Emigrants W. G. Sebald 1992 German German
1500 Pilgrimage Dorothy Richardson 1915 British English
1501 One, No One and One Hundred Thousand Luigi Pirandello 1926 Italian Italian
1521 The Last Samurai Helen DeWitt 2000 American English
1526 Demian Hermann Hesse 1919 German German
1557 Tender Buttons Gertrude Stein 1914 American English
1569 The Bald Soprano Eugène Ionesco 1950 French French
1572 Titus Alone Mervyn Peake 1959 British English
1597 The Fruits of the Earth André Gide 1897 French French
1598 On the Heights of Despair Emil Cioran 1934 Romanian Romanian
1603 The 120 Days of Sodom Marquis de Sade 1904 French French
1612 The Real Life of Sebastian Knight Vladimir Nabokov 1941 Russian English
1616 King Ubu Alfred Jarry 1896 French French
1629 Collected Poems Stéphane Mallarmé 1887 French French
1634 The Americans Robert Frank 1959 American English
1638 Delta of Venus Anaïs Nin 1977 French English
1641 The ABC of Reading Ezra Pound 1934 American English
1687 The Medium Is The Massage Marshall McLuhan 1967 Canadian English
1712 Erasure Percival Everett 2001 American English
1730 Oreo Fran Ross 1974 American English
1745 Scenes From The Life Of A Faun Arno Schmidt 1953 German German
1747 Lenz Georg Buchner 1836 German German
1747 Lyrical Ballads William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge 1798 British English
1747 Ariel Sylvia Plath 1965 American English
1759 Blood and Guts in High School Kathy Acker 1978 American English
1760 The Ravishing of Lol Stein Marguerite Duras 1964 French French
1762 The Erasers Alain Robbe-Grillet 1953 French French
1767 G. John Berger 1972 British English
1771 The Egghead Republic Arno Schmidt 1957 German German
1784 The Street of Crocodiles Bruno Schulz 1934 Polish Polish
1804 Sleepless Nights Elizabeth Hardwick 1979 American English
1808 Wry-Blue Loves Tristan Corbière 1873 French French
1820 Surrealist Manifesto André Breton 1924 French French
1823 Extinction Thomas Bernhard 1986 Austrian German
1830 A Void Georges Perec 1969 French French
1832 Krapp's Last Tape Samuel Beckett 1958 Irish English
1841 Two Serious Ladies Jane Bowles 1943 American English
1853 How Late It Was, How Late James Kelman 1994 Scottish English
1871 JR William Gaddis 1975 American English
1876 Mythistorema George Seferis 1935 Greek Greek
1878 A Tale Of A Tub Jonathan Swift 1704 British English
1885 The Solitudes Luis de Góngora 1613 Spanish Spanish
1896 The Vegetarian Han Kang 2007 Korean Korean
1914 The Collected Stories Of Lydia Davis Lydia Davis 2009 American English
1915 The Left-Handed Woman Peter Handke 1976 Austrian German
1938 In Watermelon Sugar Richard Brautigan 1968 American English
1941 The Luzhin Defense Vladimir Nabokov 1930 Russian Russian
1956 The Invention of Solitude Paul Auster 1982 American English
1965 The Female Man Joanna Russ 1975 American English
1993 On Beauty Zadie Smith 2005 British English
1995 Concrete Thomas Bernhard 1982 Austrian German
2051 The Complete Poems of Marianne Moore Marianne Moore 1967 American English
2065 The Palm At The End Of The Mind Wallace Stevens 1971 American English
2074 The Theater and Its Double Antonin Artaud 1938 French French
2075 The Clay Machine-gun Victor Pelevin 1996 Russian Russian
2090 Moravagine Blaise Cendrars 1926 Swiss French
2109 Giles Goat-Boy John Barth 1966 American English
2130 Dangerous Visions Harlan Ellison 1967 American English
2133 The Golden Gate Vikram Seth 1986 Indian English
2140 Los lanzallamas Roberto Arlt 1931 Argentinian Spanish
2143 Novel on Yellow Paper Stevie Smith 1936 British English
2172 Sexing the Cherry Jeanette Winterson 1989 British English
2177 W, or the Memory of Childhood Georges Perec 1975 French French
2237 Citizen Claudia Rankine 2014 American English
2238 Memoirs of Martinus Scriblerus Scriblerus Club 1741 British English
2238 Hell Henri Barbusse 1908 French French
2238 Impressions of Africa Raymond Roussel 1910 French French
2238 Tarr Wyndham Lewis 1918 British English
2238 The Apes of God Wyndham Lewis 1930 British English
2238 Monica Saunders Lewis 1930 British Welsh
2238 Insatiability Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz 1930 Polish Polish
2238 Conversations in Sicily Elio Vittorini 1941 Italian Italian
2238 Dangling Man Saul Bellow 1944 American English
2238 Arcanum 17 André Breton 1944 French French
2238 Exercises in Style Raymond Queneau 1947 French French
2238 Death Sentence Maurice Blanchot 1948 French French
2238 L'Abbé C Georges Bataille 1950 French French
2238 Asphodel Hilda Doolittle 1921 American English
2238 Near To The Wild Heart Clarice Lispector 1943 Brazilian Portuguese
2340 Poems, New And Collected, 1957 1997 Wislawa Szymborska 1998 Polish Polish
2341 Trilce César Vallejo 1922 Peruvian Spanish
2341 Juan De Mairena Antonio Machado 1936 Spanish Spanish
2344 Poems of Góngora Luis de Góngora 1601 Spanish Spanish
2344 Spain, Take This Chalice from Me César Vallejo 1939 Peruvian Spanish
2355 Our Sister Killjoy Ama Ata Aidoo 1977 Ghanaian English
2356 The Manila Rope Veijo Meri 1957 Finnish Finnish
2364 For a New Novel Alain Robbe-Grillet 1963 French French
2366 Second Thoughts Michel Butor 1957 French French
2367 Mason & Dixon Thomas Pynchon 1997 American English
2375 The Quest For Corvo A. J. A. Symons 1934 British English
2428 Looking Back Norman Douglas 1933 British English
2450 The Poems of Jaime Gil de Biedma
 Jaime Gil de Biedma
 1960 Spanish Spanish
2466 Gogol's Wife Tommaso Landolfi 1953 Italian Italian
2471 Mannen utan väg Erik Lindegren 1942 Swedish Swedish
2480 The Poems Of Gerard Manley Hopkins Gerald Manley Hopkins 1918 British English
2504 Lunch Poems Frank O'Hara 1964 American English
2528 Faces In The Water Janet Frame 1961 New Zealander English
2587 The Unfortunates B. S. Johnson 1969 British English
2591 Betrayed by Rita Hayworth Manuel Puig 1968 Argentinian Spanish
2597 The Melancholy of Resistance László Krasznahorkai 1989 Hungarian Hungarian
2616 Greguerias Ramón Gómez de la Serna 1910 Spanish Spanish
2616 Leviathan Arno Schmidt 1949 German German
2629 How to be both Ali Smith 2014 British English
2637 Language, Truth, And Logic A. J. Ayer 1936 British English
2650 Collected Poems Arthur Rimbaud 1898 French French
2687 Our Lord Don Quixote Miguel de Unamuno 1935 Spanish Spanish
2694 Under Milk Wood Dylan Thomas 1954 British English
2750 The Complete Poetry of César Vallejo César Vallejo 1968 Peruvian Spanish
2797 The Infernal Desire Machines Of Doctor Hoffman Angela Carter 1972 British English
2812 The 42nd Parallel John Dos Passos 1930 American English
2820 The Blazing World Margaret Cavendish 1666 British English
2833 Hydriotaphia, Urn Burial Sir Thomas Browne 1658 British English
2833 The Temptation To Exist Emil Cioran 1956 Romanian French
2833 One Hundred Poems Kenneth Slessor 1944 Australian English
2889 The Beauty Of The Husband Anne Carson 2001 Canadian English
2903 Dreamtigers Jorge Luis Borges 1960 Argentinian Spanish
2916 The Cannibal John Hawkes 1949 American English
2918 To The Friend Who Did Not Save My Life Hervé Guibert 1990 French French
2947 Paroles Jacques Prévert 1946 French French
2950 House Mother Normal B. S. Johnson 1971 British English